Hypothetically
by Hannalore Dayne
Summary: Sequel to "Too Close". Lex thinks on pretty much everything and has a conversation with Lana. Whitney vignette at the end.
1. Amber

Disclaimer: I don't own anybody. This is the 21st century, people! Nobody owns anybody! Get over it. J 

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Important Note: I finally realized what all of my Smallville stories are. They are a saga. All of them are these nice little stories that tie into each other, and they all happen within a few hours or days of each other. The reason this story is so pointless is because it's part of the saga! Get it? See? That's so cool. Anyway, I write a new story every time the viewpoint/plot changes significantly. If anybody's interested, this is technically the fourth story in The Saga. This is the chronological order: Just Friends, As Close As You'll Ever Get, Too Close, and now Hypothetically. I'm so proud of myself. I already have a story arc planned, right up through about two or three more stories. Happiness!

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Not So Important Note: I love "Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You" and I want to let everyone know that _Conspiracy Theory_ was the best movie ever and you all have to watch it.

Amber. Swirling, golden liquid bubbled in his glass as he held it up to the light. Idly he wondered where he'd formed that habit. Probably his father. Strange how you could pick up mannerisms from people you didn't even like. He brought the small glass to his lips and sucked in as much of the ambrosia as he could. The night was cold and lonely. The disgusting, dusty mansion he called home was so silent that it made him want to scream, and the drink he had now finished was the only thing keeping him company. Wincing from the strength of the bourbon, he put down the glass. It clinked as it hit the mahogany table. What was the point of having your own mansion if you couldn't put down shotglasses with no coasters?

The walls were closing in on him. A few deep breaths put them back where they belonged. He looked out the window. Dark, dark, and cows. Cows and corn and tractors. That was all he could see every time he looked outside. Sometimes it depressed him, sometimes it made him feel at peace. It depended on his mood. Tonight he liked the darkness. He wondered if the mansion would feel like home if he turned off all the lights. He would sit in the silence and the blackness and the only sound would be his breathing.

"You sound suicidal," he told himself. He shook his head to clear the depressing images in his head. Stubbornly he turned on his computer and checked to see if the scientists from the city had analyzed the meteor rock sample he had sent them. They hadn't. He sighed and scrubbed his bare head. Every day he came infinitesimally closer to discovering what it was about Clark that made Lex's survival such a mystery. He had long since decided that it _was_ Clark that was the variable in this case. Clark was the only thing that didn't make sense. And last night Clark had proved that he was indeed holding something back.

__

"Let it go, Lex. Please." Those had been his exact words. There was something in the high schooler's eyes that told Lex that he was weary of keeping secrets. But what secrets? What was there? His hand tightened into a fist. It was going to haunt him until he knew. And Clark wanted to tell him. He had seen that in his face, the hungry, longing desire to open his mouth and let everything pour out. He wondered if Clark knew how clearly his emotions showed on his face. Maybe it had been that night. Clark had been upset, he had seen that. "_What are you running from?"_ he had asked himself. What, indeed. Lex shook his head irritably. So many mysteries centered around one boy. He headed back to his desk to refill his glass.

Perhaps Clark had been upset about Lana. Lex lounged in his chair, eyes tracing lines on the ceiling, with nothing better to do than speculate about others' lives. Clark was often upset about Lana. It was quite easy when she had a boyfriend who constantly kissed her and hugged her. Unconsciously Lex made a disgusted noise. Whitney was the epitome of a small-town hero. The whole damn place was so tight that the town declared a holiday when the high school won a football game. Hence Whitney's rise to fame. In Metropolis that boy would be swallowed in seconds, overshadowed by some suit-wearing nineteen-year-old with a cell phone. It was lucky for the jock he had been born in Smallville.

Lex himself didn't see what was so wonderful about Miss Lana Lang. Sure, she was beautiful, but so were so many others. She was almost sickeningly nice and had unusual gravity for someone her age. A strange combination that called for a pedestal in a place like Smallville. _Small town,_ he thought again. It seemed like everyone was in love with Lana. Clark had just been caught in the whirlpool. The way he looked at her... it was heartbreaking. The boy felt so much like Lex's younger brother. If Lex had ever had a sibling, maybe his life would have been easier. Living with his father had been a nightmare that he couldn't wake up from, because that was his waking reality. Nightmares were a relief when they came.

His father had never cared about him. He cared about money and power. It was a sick addiction that controlled his life, but the worst part of it was that his father controlled the addiction. He knew exactly what he was doing when he placed his son lower on his priority list than the need to corner the fertilizer market in small-town America. Lex's hand tightened around the little glass. Well, he didn't need his father. He gained nothing by sitting in the dark feeling sorry for himself. He would rise to the top and crush his father's legacy all on his own. He would smash it to bits, grind up the pieces, and build a new legacy from the ashes. His father would die penniless and alone, wishing he had paid more attention to the son that he couldn't love.

With another shotglass his mind wandered back to Lana. She was saccharine and stereotypical, it was true, but there was something… he didn't know. He remembered with an uncomfortable shiver last week, when he had tried to talk to her about Clark and she had responded by almost kissing him. By playing a trick on him. It was juvenile, while at the same time it was frightening. It had been such a wild departure from his impression of her character that he had seriously wondered for a moment if she was on something. But she had been completely serious. And his reaction had haunted him ever since. Perhaps that was the catch with Lana. Her ability to make anyone love her, just for a moment, and then walk away trailing heartstrings.

Not that Lex loved her. He didn't, not even close. He wasn't even sure he liked her that much. Lex had been with so many girls, so _many_ that it seemed ridiculous to him that she would stand out over all the others, especially as they had never been together. _And never will be,_ he told himself firmly. He nodded. Then he shook his head and put a hand to his head. The town was getting to him. In Metropolis he would have never given her a second glance, let alone try to analyze his feelings about her. He had no feelings about her. It was just this cramped, tiny village squatting like a toad in the middle of nowhere. In a place like this, you grabbed the entertainment you could get, even if you were deluding yourself in order to get some. And he _was_ deluding himself.

"Now I know how Clark feels," he whispered. Except that Clark had surrendered to the Midwestern charms of the homecoming queen and was completely lost to her. And she didn't even notice it. That was why he was helping him, pushing Lana in Clark's direction. She had told him, that strange night, that he couldn't make her love Clark, but he could, and he would. It was only a matter of time. Clark Kent would get what he wanted if it was the last thing Lex ever did.

His glass clinked on the table. He felt very removed, as if his mansion was floating underneath him and slowly tipping to the left. Then Lex fell on the floor and he realized that he had downed the entire bottle of bourbon. He got up. Looking at his chair on the floor, he began to giggle. Then he was chuckling, laughing hysterically, bent over and trembling. Still laughing, he half-fell and ended up sitting and sprawled against the wall. His laughter faded away. His throat felt tight. Blinking away tears, he whispered thickly, "You're a sorry sight." He took a breath. "An estranged billionaire's son, drinking himself to sleep in an abandoned mansion." He wanted to laugh again, but he was already crying and it would have confused him too much. His wet eyes closed as if weighted down and he fell abruptly, almost violently asleep.


	2. What The Morning Brings

The morning was a brutal reality. His housekeeper came in and shrieked when she found him splayed awkwardly on the floor of his office, and with that rude awakening, he officially began his hangover. His head felt like a thousand needles tied together in the shape of a skull. Thanking God that it was Saturday, he took the coldest shower he had ever dared to take. After that he felt hysterically awake, but his migraine was in no way relieved. His housekeeper gave him Advil and threw away the empty bourbon bottle with a side-glance at him. He changed into something loose and, wanting to stick his head in the lake, tried to eat without throwing up. It didn't work. After what seemed like an hour the Advil took effect and he was able to swallow a piece of toast. Then the mansion began to suffocate him as it always eventually did, and although the only thing he wanted to do was to lie on his bed until his head stopped hurting, he went outside to walk.

The air was cool and did wonders for his headache. Fall leaves were spinning lazily in the air as if suspended by strings, and the breeze was racing around the treetops. The same sleepy energy permeated everything, and Lex began to feel calmer and definitely more relaxed. He refused to look back at the mansion. It depressed him to see the huge, hulking chunk of Scotland crouching in the middle of this rural wonderland. Strange, how only last night he had thought of it as an undeveloped, economically retarded village. His opinion on Smallville fluctuated every day, but his ultimate impression remained the same: a gold mine waited to be cut and melted into pure blocks of money. The town had screaming potential that no one else had seen to its full extent, not even his father.

As he passed out of the mansion's grounds, he began to hum. He hadn't hummed in so long… The song was an old one: "You're just too good to be true… can't take my eyes off of you…" The vibration in his throat was unfamiliar but pleasing, like a cat's purring. "You'd be like heaven to touch…" The words played in his head as he hummed the tune. He began to smile just a little. "I want to hold you so much…" For a few minutes he almost forgot about his headache. The further he got from the mansion, the better he felt. Soon he was sauntering more than walking and his humming was louder than before. In a moment he was outright singing.

"I love you, baby…" he sang quietly.

"And if it's quite alright…" another voice joined.

Shocked, he stopped singing and walking, looking around for the gatecrasher.

"I'm sorry," said Lana Lang tentatively. "I didn't mean to intrude."

Lex covered his embarrassment by smiling with a hint of sarcasm. "You're not intruding," he said. "What are you doing out here?"

She shrugged. "I jog through here some mornings." He suddenly noticed that she was in running clothes. "What are you doing here?"

"I live here," Lex said, half-smiling.

She touched her forehead. "Right," she said. "Of course." They stood there awkwardly for a moment.

"Well, I'm walking back," he said. "So I'll see you?"

"Can I join you?" asked Lana. "It takes me closer to my house."

He looked at her quizzically. "How can it?" he said. "The Luthor mansion is on the edge of town."

She grinned half-hopefully. "It's closer if you have a car!"

He couldn't help grinning as well, though her slight change in volume hurt his head. "Tired of exercising?"

"Yeah, I've had enough for today."

"Well, then, you're welcome to join me."

They walked back to the grounds in relative silence. Lex would have talked, but his headache was starting to return. He needed more Advil. There was something keeping Lana from talking too, but he was too focused on his own head to figure out what it was. When they got to the house, he asked if she wouldn't mind waiting for a moment. She didn't. He climbed the broad stairs and tracked down his housekeeper, who was so irritated that he had interrupted her considerable work that she gave him the whole bottle of Advil to take with him. He took some pills and stuffed the bottle in his pocket. Trotting down the stairs to join Lana, he found her inspecting a grand painting on the wall.

"Impressive," she said when she saw him. "Who is it?"

He studied it for a moment. "I'm not sure, to tell the truth. Some famous relative from Scotland that invented economy or something similar, I'm sure."

Lana laughed. "He looks like you. Doesn't he?"

He cocked his head. "Yeah, but his hairstyle's a bit different from mine." The man in the painting had a full head of red hair.

Lana shook her head, smiling. "Always so dry," she said. "Who comes up with your lines?"

He tapped his bald head. "I do."

She laughed again. He liked the sound. "Ready to go?" he said. She nodded.


	3. Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You

He tried to drive slower than usual, since he had a passenger in the car. He had always driven alone since he came to Smallville, so it was strange to have someone else in the car with him, and he wasn't sure he liked it.

"You know the way to my house?" she asked.

"I've driven past it many times," he responded.

She nodded. "I need to be back soon."

"Got plans with the quarterback?" Her silence made him glance at her. She looked closed off, the way she usually did when she was angry. "Something wrong?"

She looked past the windshield for a minute. "Whitney and I are having a disagreement right now," she said.

He gave a wry smile. "That was so politically correct that it had to be a lie," he said. "What's going on?"

She shook her head with a little false smile. "He did something that upset me. I asked him to apologize yesterday and he insisted that he didn't do anything." She looked down at her hands. "I'm not exactly speaking to him."

"What'd he do?" Lex was interested. Perhaps he could use this to his advantage.

She was silent a moment before answering. "He… he forced Clark to take my necklace the night he strung him up." She swallowed. It was obviously a sore subject. "He lied to me about it twice. And now he won't admit that he did anything wrong."

Lex shook his head, trying not to smile. Clark had taken his advice. "Wow," he said. "That's bad." He turned at a stop sign.

She shot him a look, but he was serious. "Yeah," she said. "I know. I… feel so bad for Clark. It's sort of my fault. He returned the necklace and I thought it was Whitney and then he came over to make sure I got it, and…" She was silent. Lex could practically see the wheels turning. Suddenly she turned in her seat to face him. "Lex, what would you do if you felt something but you weren't sure that you were supposed to, or that you even did, or if it was wrong?" After she stopped she bit her lip, as if she hadn't meant to say all that. "From a strictly hypothetical point of view," she said weakly.

He nodded. "Of course. Hypothetical. Well." He thought of how to phrase his question. "Are we talking about Clark?" He asked. "Hypothetically," he added.

Lana stared out the windshield. "Hypothetically…" she said, "We might be talking about Clark."

Lex nodded again, suspicions confirmed. He felt like grinning, but he didn't. "Well," he said. "I always believe in taking the bull by the horns." She looked at him quickly. He continued, "I believe that being shy and stalling is the worst thing a person can do, and if you feel anything, you should explore the feeling instead of shutting it off." She was looking at him seriously. "Can I ask what else happened that night?" he said after a moment's hesitation. He had realized suddenly that the night Clark had been upset was the night he had told Lana about the necklace. Do-gooder that he was, Clark still wouldn't have been upset that Lana was angry with Whitney. Well, maybe a little, but not enough to produce the state Lex had seen that night.

"What do you mean?" Lana said quickly.

He shrugged. "It seems like there's something you're not telling me."

She stared at him. An image of a deer in headlights came to mind. Then she looked down. "I can't believe I'm telling you this," she said slowly. He waited. "But… I kissed Clark that night. After he told me. I was upset," she said quickly, defensively. "I was upset and confused, and I…"

"And now you're not sure if you meant it or not." Lex finished.

She nodded, biting her bottom lip unconsciously.

Lex sighed softly. He didn't know what to do now. He couldn't honestly say that she loved Clark. She didn't, not yet. His propaganda would not be well received. On the other hand, he didn't want to push her towards Whitney because he really did think that the football star didn't deserve her. She had more class than that. He hesitated. "Lana… I can't choose your opinion for you. But do you want to know what I really think?"

"Yeah," she said. "I do."

"I think that you deserve better than the quarterback. And if 'better' is Clark, then you should go get him before somebody else does." He was silent for just a moment. "And I do think that Clark is 'better'."

She looked at him, devoid of expression. He could see her turning over his words in her mind.

"Here's your house," he said. They had pulled up next to the white fence that marked Nell's property. The trees that arched over their heads shaded them from the sunlight. Lana, after a moment, blinked and got out of the car. Lex followed suit. When he came around the car she was already at the gate. "Lana," he called.

She stopped and turned, not quite looking at him.

"Like I said," he told her. "I can't choose your opinion for you."

"I know," she said a bit sadly. "I know."

He hesitated. He didn't want to let her go like that. "Lana, if you…" he searched for the words. "If you ever need to talk, I'm here." He sounded totally absurd. Totally ridiculous. He sounded like a grief counselor, or a woman. But all Lana did was nod and smile a little. "You can come over any time," he added. Then he mentally shook himself. What?

She smiled. "Thanks, Lex," she said. "You've been a big help."

He shrugged and smiled. Inside he was very confused. It was like he was on autopilot. He would never have expected himself to say those things. _"If you need to talk, I'm here_?" Teen soap operas had similar scripts. "Just being a friend," he said. "Hypothetically."

This time she laughed, and went inside. He walked back to the car and got in. Once he had started to drive, he said, "What was that?" He did not respond. Instead he shook his head. "I need more Advil."

He turned on the radio to an Oldies' station. "You're just too good to be true…" the speaker sang. Lex grinned in surprise. He listened for a while, and by the time he pulled in front of the Luthor house, he was singing along. "Oh, pretty baby, don't let me walk away, oh pretty baby, now that I've found you stay…" He turned off the car and tucked the keys in his pocket. Humming, he locked the car doors and went inside. His housekeeper almost had a heart attack when she saw him humming, but he ignored her and went upstairs to try and burn off his headache on the treadmill.


	4. Time To Think

Whitney sat in his room, tossing a football into the air. He had stopped paying attention to the ball. His thoughts were somewhere else while his hands caught and threw, caught and threw. Lana's voice played through his mind like a broken record, shouting, angry with him. Disappointed in him. She had been so hurt, so shocked… what else could he have done? Told the truth? Told her everything and watched those hurting eyes look at him for the rest of the week? No, he had to lie. And now she was mad at him for that. Where had he screwed up? His heart was aching because he knew that Lana was alone now, refusing to talk to him but needing someone to talk to. And the part that killed him was that he couldn't talk to her because _he_ was what she needed to talk about.

He barely noticed as the football fell from his hands to the floor. He wasn't sure, and he didn't want to think about it, but Lana probably wanted to break up with him. He wasn't sure why, exactly. What he had done wasn't enough. The only thing Whitney could think of was Clark. She had kissed him on the cheek, after all, that one time, and then she had gone on a date with him, no matter what she said. It _was _a date. Whitney was trying very hard not be angry about that. After all, overreacting had gotten him into this mess with Lana in the first place. He bent down and picked up the football. Standing, he went to his window and looked out. It was dark, and he couldn't see anything beyond the trees in his yard.

He loved her. He knew that. He had known that for a while now. But he had never told her because he wasn't sure if she felt the same. And now… well, he was almost sure she didn't feel the same. Her face, her smile, her kiss: all as precious to him as his own life. And he hadn't told anyone. Now he sort of wished that he had told her. Maybe if he had told her then she wouldn't have been so mad at him. _I hate weekends,_ he thought. Two days. Lana would avoid him for two whole days. At school she couldn't avoid him because they had classes together and he would try to talk, but last night she had asked him not to call her, or come over. She needed time to think, she said. That was what tipped him off that she might want to break up with him. He knew all the classic lines. Every guy did. _I just need some time to think. Our friendship is so important to me. I love you, but not _that _way._ There were more.

Whitney sighed lengthily. It would have been better if she had said they could talk. He wanted to talk. He wanted to tell her he was sorry, and why, and what he was going to do to make it up to her. He wanted to explain everything and make her understand that he never wanted to hurt her. He hated this waiting. He had to sit in his room and wait and wonder what she was thinking and if she still cared for him enough to maintain their relationship. He felt angry, but there was nowhere to center that anger. It wasn't anybody's fault but his own, and he couldn't do anything about it. He left the window and threw the football across the room. It hit his pillow and bounced onto his blanket.

He felt so antsy it was crazy. Ordinarily he would have called the guys and practiced for a game, but the season was over. Besides, he wasn't sure if he wanted all their questions. He didn't want to tell anyone about his and Lana's fight yet. Instead, he went downstairs to watch TV. Maybe there was wrestling on or something. The house was quiet. His mom was working her second shift, and his dad was out back working on the car he was restoring. Whitney searched for the remote, found it between the couch cushions, and turned on the television. He flopped onto the couch and tried to forget that Lana was still thinking about whether or not to forgive him and that he wasn't allowed to call.

Wrestling wasn't on.


End file.
